Page 44 of The Lost Guard's Healer

“ —Please,” Rourk cuts in. When my eyes meet his again, those dark irises are pleading. Earnest. “Come on,” he says, his voice teasing but not quite hiding the serious note behind it. “Didn’t you hear me say I’m leaving? I’m giving you the chance to say whatever the fuck you want to me without having to see me later.” A not-quite-believable grin sprouts on his lips. “This is your only chance to finally get out all those insults you’ve thought of since the day we met. Formally, anyway.”

But none of those insults feel true anymore.

Still, I nod. “Okay,” I say. “Let’s go.”

Rourk tentatively offers me his arm.

I hesitate. Look into his eyes and can’t quite read the question within them.

Then I wrap my arm around his, let him pull me a little closer and lead me away.

Away is ten minutes away from the village, tucked into the treeline. Rourk walks us toward a fallen tree before releasing my arm and sitting.

I gingerly take a seat beside him. “What did you want to talk about?”

“Don’t want to get your insults out first, Galene?” he asks, his voice light.

I stare at him for a long moment. “No,” I say finally. “Not anymore.”

He nods and falls silent again, but I can’t sit inside that quiet any longer. “Rourk, you brought me all the way out here. Just… say whatever it is you want to say.”

Gently—hesitantly, like he’s waiting for me to pull away—he rests a hand on my knee. The touch is electrifying. He says, “I wanted you to know that I will always remember you.”

His words sear through me. There’s something about the stark honesty, the vulnerability, that melts my heart even as I freeze. It’s not even the words themselves, I don’t think. It’s the intention behind them. All the layers of meaning I could peel back if I wanted to. “What?”

“I will remember you,” he reiterates. “Forever. Fondly. I will tell stories about you to anyone who will listen. I will detail your eyes and your sharp wit and your determination to never be less and to always be more than the others around you.”

“Rourk,” I say. My voice is soft. “You don’t have to say that.”

“I mean it,” he says roughly. “And I only ask one thing in return for this—this lifetime of longing I am to be subjected to from the very moment I walk away from you.”

My throat feels dry, but my eyes don’t. I have to fight back the tears that build. I realize now, in this moment, as Rourk gives me his version of a goodbye, that I don’t want him to leave. And that I will remember him, too. Forever. Fondly.

So I whisper. “Okay.” I let myself soak in the feeling of his thumb brushing against my knee. “What do you ask?”

His dark eyes stare deep into mine as he says, “That you remember me, too. I don’t care if it’s in fondness or fury. I don’t care if it’s only in passing, as you’re tending to wounds similar to the ones I had, or if it’s only when someone mentions my name. Either of them.” His voice is earnest now. “Just remember me, Galene, please.”

My hands shake as I fight back my tears. I can’t help myself as I reach for Rourk and press each palm to one of his cheeks, cupping his face in my hands. “I will remember you every day,” I swear to him. “And I will miss you every night.”

Rourk doesn’t try to kiss me, though I think that, in this moment, I would let him.

Instead, he pulls me tight to his body and wraps me in a hug.

It somehow means more to me than a kiss ever could.

Chapter nineteen

Rourk

Ispend my final night in the hut I’ve called home for the past week and a half, listening to the rustling trees and heavy rain. I was told that rain, especially storms, are rare in these parts of the Wildlands. I lay there, far from sleep, wondering what this unfamiliar sensation is that’s been coming over me. This anxiety and uneasiness.

The low sounds of a heated argument stir me awake early the next morning. A few voices are disturbing the quiet air, and they don’t sound happy. I crawl off of my bedding and inch toward where I can see outside through the gaps in the hut flaps. The light is low, with the sun barely over the horizon, and the main field looks empty.

I try another angle and see some people across the field. The old man, Yovin, is there sitting on a log far to the side. He is speaking with Colm and Magdalena.

“This is ridiculous,” Colm is saying, his voice low but angered.

“And yet it is real,” Magdalena says. Her voice is normally bright and casual, but now she sounds almost unrecognizable, her tone dark. Far more commanding and controlled.

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